Cycling, Fame, Drugs and the Individual

Marco Pantani was a loved cyclist. He had the ability to gain the adoration of many loyal fans. Pantani was not just a superstar, he had athletic results. In 1998 he won both the Tour de France and Giro D'Italia; the worlds two most gruiling bike races. In particular, Pantani was known for his ability to climb. His record climb up the dreaded l'Alpe d'Huez, is still famous. Pantani was an inspiration to many people and to many cyclists. Pantani was a loved man.

In 1999 Pantani was kicked out of the Giro because of doping allegations.

The pressure of his lifestyle became too much for The Pirate. He began to change. He stopped performing on his bike. He became anti-social. On February 15, 2004, Pantani was found dead in his Italian hotel room. It was determined his death was caused by a cocaine overdose.

It is unfortunate that the gallivanting cheating cyclists in this day and age do not realize the effects that their cheating has. It hurts more than their human bodies. It hurts their fans who look up to them. It hurts cyclists who aren't cheating and can't physically beat someone who's body is pumped with synthetic winning juice. It hurts the image of cycling. More than all of these aspects, it corrupts their personal souls. It is a tragedy that a cyclist, a human, with so much potential in life and in his sport, would resort to cheating. This cheating ultimately caused the end of his life.

Every cyclist knows the name Marco Pantani. Every cheating cyclist knows that name. They know his story and his tragic death, yet they still go down the same dark path. If not for the purity of the sport, don't you wish people would stop hurting their bodies for the preservation of their human spirit? Is it that these cyclists want a climb of the Giro dedicated to their name? Or would they rather finish a Giro knowing they were honest and clean. Turning a blind eye to Pantani's story is like saying he died in vain. May his legacy live on and teach us all how to live better lives.

Click here to watch a beautiful YouTube tribute to The Pirate.

Pantani image courtesy of this blog.

Cycling is pure.

I couldn't help but write this blog, as I am feeling very passionate about this this topic! Right after the events of the 2007 tour, I found myself having the same converstation with many people. "Cycling is ruined forever!" is what many people told me. I want to make it publicly known that I disagree. Cycling is pure.

I choose to look to professional baseball, football and other classic American sports for my example. In baseball you have Barry Bonds who is blatently using steroids to gain unfair advantage. The Major League Baseball officals turn their heads and let it continue. Fans let it continue. Do they give up on their favorite baseball player even after heavy cheating allegations hit? No! Surrounding the Bonds case, baseball revenues continued to increase! When people cheat in cycling, their kicked out of the tour. They're suspended from the sport. They're practically shunned by their fans.

Then there's the NFL. Their commissioners and athletes seem to have the same philosophy as in MLB. Testing is pesky, it gets in the way. Who cares if people are cheating as long as it creates good entertainment right? NFL Union Head Gene Upshaw said claimed that we don't know if doping with Human Growth Hormone even is effective. He said that in order to detect this type of cheating, you have to test closely to the time that the HGH was taken. "That means our guys would have to be pin cushions," he said, "They're not going to be pin cushions."

Then we turn back to cycling. Professional cyclists are pin cusions. This is because they want to win and they want to win clean. So tons of people were kicked out of the 2007 tour. At least they were kicked out! If that happened in the NFL or MLB (like it has with Mr. Bonds), officials wouldn't kick out the athletes, but turn a blind eye to the cheating for the sake of good entertainment and high profits.

How much more cheating will fans tollerate? From an ESPN Article, "Perhaps the answer to cheating lies within each of us," a fan is quoted as saying "It isn't just about sports anymore. It's about fame and stardom and making the eye-popping dunk or hitting the tape-measure home run." Are you still supporting a cheater? The sport of cycling is able to clean itself up pretty well because the fans have a zero tollerance for their star athletes cheating. The ESPN article continues, "It's now do as you please and deny, deny, deny when you get caught. Truth and accountability have gone completely out the window." I believe it's the lack of accoutnablility on the part of the athlete and the sports commission that dirties a sport. Mr. Bonds and MLB are turning their cheek to cheating. At least in cycling, some cyclists may deny cheating but the cycling federation won't put up with it.

I applaud professional cycling for being the cleanest sport out there. In order to clean, you have to rinse off the dirt. That is exactly what cycling officials did this summer. New teams are surfacing like the new American Team Slipstream. Cycling takes active measures to keep things clean. That's why cycling is pure.

Cyclists talk.

It's probably the most dreaded question for a professional cyclist. Standing at a podium after a big win and a member of the press corners you into discussing cheating in cycling.

There's always been doping in sports, according to Lance Armstrong. This is what he told Bob Schieffer in a conversational interview at the Aspen Institute. Although it's always happened in sports, Lance also believes there are solutions and controls that we should follow to secure the preserve the sport of cycling. According to Lance, in the world of doping, the sport of cycling has had the hardest time. talks about doping in sports.

Why does cycling have the hardest time with doping? I agree with Lance. Cycling is simply the hardest sport. "It's a lot harder than a 9 inning game," says Lance. I also believe it is the most physically and mentally demanding. For this reason, many people who are not physically or mentally strong enough for the sport turn to cheating to help them succeed, or at least finish. When faced with a course such as the Tour de France which is essentially 20 days of pain, a human can get desperate.

The desperation in some cases is not fueling a desire to win, but to finish and survive. The 2007 Tour de France covered 3,550 kilometers spending 7 days in the mountains, 11 in the country side and 2 days in time trials. If you don't believe cycling is a hard sport, I urge you to get on your bike and ride 2,000 miles in the Alps of France for three weeks. I promise you that your point of view will change. (See map to the left. Click to go to www.letour.fr for more information about the 2007 Tour).

To watch Lance talk about cheating in cycling, view this clip from Fora TV begining at 17:13.



Just recently, Floyd Landis was renounced as the 2006 Tour de France champion on claims of doping. If you know how emotionally attached I get to the American professional cyclists, you'll know that this was a serious let down. I guess what surpised me when Landis was found guilty, is that he didn't give up. The day after doping allegations surfaced, Landis was touring morning news shows such as Good Morning America. I felt like he was playing with my head. Of course he's guilty, the science can prove it and his Tour de France come-back in 2006 was too good to be true. Still, I held on to a flicker of hope that science could be proved wrong and that Landis would be declared 2006 Tour winner.



Here are two men. Two champions. The world's best cyclist (second MAYBE to Eddy Merckx), Lance Armstrong, and 2006 American favorite, Floyd Landis. Both won the tour. Both have been heavily tested for drugs. Both have been accused of doping. One was proven guilty and de-throwned. I know that I stand by Lance in the fact I believe he won the Tour clean. I used to stand by Landis until the science proved his fate. Who do you stand by? Can we ever trust our professional cyclists? I agree with claim, "Innocent until proven guilty." Lance has never been "proven guilty." Landis has. I think it is quite clear where I stand.

Tour de France map from http://www.letour.fr

They fell like flies.

This year they fell like flies. One after the other. It reminded of me of the windowsills in my basement. Dark cold windowsills filled with dust and dead flies. The flies in my windowsill had the same look on their faces as the cyclists who cheated in this year’s Tour de France. Cold frozen guilty faces. Now, I’ll never be sure of why the flies always looked so guilty… maybe it was because they knew they had the last word as they landed on my dinner and flew downstairs to die…or maybe flies always look guilty like that. I found these frozen flies in the same condition that I found the professional cyclists. The only difference is that I looked up to the professional cyclists, and I don’t really look up to houseflies.

The 2007 Tour started on a hot July 7th. Everything was going smoothly. It seems that all the professional cyclists had recovered from the dethroning of last year’s winner Floyd Landis whose fate was still undecided. With the 2006 tour behind them, Tour de France 2007 had begun.

The first to fall was Patrik Sinkewitz of the famous T-Mobile team who, after stage 8, tested positive for high testosterone levels. This happened after he crashed and withdrew from the race. It was at this time that Sinkewitz’s test results surfaced. The rest of T-Mobile withdrew from the tour whereupon Sinkewitz was sacked.

Next to fall was my sister’s favorite: Alexandre Vinokourov, a courageous young rider, and one of the tour favorites. Stage 15 of the tour marked the end for Astana’s Vinokourov. He was believed to have the capability to take the yellow jersey. This was until a drug test revealed Vinokourov was using blood transfusions to gain an unfair advantage. Like T-Mobile, Astana sacked Vinokourov and withdrew from the tour.

Christian Moreni, a French rider for the Cofidis team withdrew from the tour after stage 16 where he participated in an anti-doping protest. After testing positive, he admitted to doping. Both he and his team withdrew from the tour.

Iban Mayo was the most surprising dropout, as I have respected him for a rider for a very long time. This Spanish rider tested positive for EPO after he had placed 16th overall in the race. His results were obviously withdrawn by the Tour de France and his team, Saunier Duval-Prodir, suspended him immediately.

The last rider to drop was not a surprise to me. Watching him ride this race was amazing. He had some miraculous rides, tromping the competition in an un-human way. This was most prevalent on Stage 16 when, despite many attacks by Discovery’s Alberto Contador, he rocketed to the end of the ride in first place. His team, Rabobank, fired him for lying to the manager about why he missed certain pre-tour drug tests. Evidentially Rasmussen had been given two warning from the International Cycling Union (UCI) and two warnings from Anti Doping Denmark for missing doping control tests.

This jumble of tour drama is what sparked my personal interest in starting this blog. After Tour de France 2007, many claimed that professional cycling was tainted and ruined forever. I strongly disagree. Despite the events of July 2007, cycling remains pure. This blog will tell you why. It will also help you further understand what doping is, the history of professional cyclists cheating and the future of the sport in light of recent scandals. I would encourage your deep discussion about this topic. Together, we will ask the questions that others may be afraid, or hesitant, to pose